Psi Research:
Survival - The Greatest Mystery

by Ginette Nachman, MD, PhD

What happens to us when we die? Is it possible that consciousness (or what some have called the "soul") survives physical death? Are our loved ones who have "passed on" really in some heavenly realm waiting to be reunited with us? Humankind has grappled with this question for millennia. And most of us develop our own personal beliefs on the matter, in some cases shaped by our own ineffable encounters touching on the beyond - being in the presence of people having "deathbed visions," having "visitation" experiences with loved ones at the moment of, or shortly after their deaths, a sense of communicating with the deceased through dreams or on some inner mental plane, "near-death experiences" of traveling to mystical heavenly realms, "apparition" experiences of seeing or sensing the presence of spirits who we may or may not have known in life, or a peculiar sense of familiarity in places we've never been before, sometimes accompanied by even more peculiar "flashbacks" from another time. In fact, these are the kinds of experiences commonly reported to places like the Rhine Research Center in Durham, by people trying to get a better understanding of their meaning and motivated to share them with researchers who might actually take them on to study.

Interestingly, relatively little scientific research has been done in this area. Perhaps because it touches so deeply into one of life's greatest mysteries - and treads so closely on what has been considered religious turf. Or perhaps because the answers don't come easily, even to those brave souls who have made study in this area their life's work.

It was this very question - Does consciousness survive physical death? -- that first drew JB and Louisa Rhine to pursue careers in what was then called psychical research, later became dubbed "parapsychology," and that many in the field today have come to think of more broadly as consciousness studies. JB and Louisa were en route to careers as botanists when they attended a lecture by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of the Sherlock Holmes series. Inspired by readings with mediums following the death of a son, Doyle was on tour to share the data with others. JB attended Doyle's lecture somewhat skeptically but emerged transformed. At last he had found what he'd been searching for, a career path worth devoting one's life to.

Rhine turned to the American Society for Psychical Research, the American counterpart of the British Society for Psychical Research, which had been founded in 1882 and had as one of its interests the study of the possibility of survival beyond physical death. Rhine also connected with William McDougall, an internationally respected British physician and psychologist who was soon to become Chair of the Department of Psychology at a new university just about to open its doors in Durham, NC.

With funding from a private donor to analyze transcripts of mediumship readings, JB was able to follow McDougall to Duke. However, it was not long before Rhine designed a broader program of scientific study into the ability of people to access information through means other than their five basic senses. The results of the research - in areas such as telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition - conducted both in Rhine's lab and in experimental settings around the globe, confirmed that yes, people have demonstrated these abilities in controlled laboratory settings, sometimes transcending not only space, but time as well. Not all the time, and not in every study, but when you look at all the data together, a consistent picture has emerged.

Given that people have the ability to access information non-locally, how do we know where the information studied in survival research, such as the information that mediums get, comes from? Rather than a deceased spirit providing the information, is it possible that mediums are simply using their own psychic abilities to access the information? This has remained the 64 million dollar question in the field. It even has a name, the "Super Psi" hypothesis.

Some researchers have shunned doing research in this area entirely, claiming that because of Super Psi one could never theoretically "prove" survival. Yet, survival research has also yielded some of the most compelling evidence that consciousness is not limited to the body, which has some amazing implications in its own right, and which, as it turns out, is also possible evidence for survival. For if we suppose that there is an element of consciousness that leaves the body at death, knowing that some aspect of our consciousness can access information beyond the confines of our body while we are alive, lends support to this idea. Finally, as Rhine realized early on, this research speaks to the very heart of the human condition. Ultimately, the understanding that we come to regarding "survival" informs not only how we view our lives, and our relationships with each other, but the choices that we make and how we live life in the present.

Ginette Nachman, MD, PhD has been involved in planning the conference "After Death: What do we know?" sponsored by the Rhine this May, bringing together leading researchers studying survival. She is a member of the Rhine Research Center Board of Directors and the Physicians Advisory Board of the International Association for Near Death Studies.